Nora Valkyrie
Nora Valkyrie is a student at Beacon Academy and a member of Team JNPR. Her weapon of choice is Magnhild, a war hammer that can transform into a grenade launcher. Appearance Nora has short orange hair and turquoise eyes. Her clothing seems to be a mix and match of some sort, with different colors and themes. She wears a collared black vest that ends at her waist. Her signature symbol, a hammer with a lightning bolt, can be found on the back. Under the vest are two layers of clothing, colored red and light-blue respectively. She also wears a white sleeveless top that forms a tiny heart shape between her cleavage and collarbone, with a white detached sleeve on each arm. She wears matching fingerless gloves on each hand. She sports a pink skirt that starts at the waist and ends mid-thigh. Her shoes are a mix of pink and white with pink laces, and display her symbol on their soles. She also seems to wear some sort of armor that begins in the middle of the shoulder and neck and ends by the waist. It seems she has a light-gray or off-white bow at the back of her skirt, with ribbon extending to the skirt's bottom. For her school uniform, she wears the standard uniform without tights under her skirt. Personality Nora is a happy-go-lucky, bubbly and cheerful young girl. She displays boundless enthusiasm and never fails to let it show after spending her first day at Beacon. As a result of this excitement, she has a tendency to talk in circles as shown in her first official appearance, during her conversation with Lie Ren in which she repeatedly mentioned being together with Ren but not in an intimate fashion. She reinforces her excitable attitude when she is shown jumping on the bed in the middle of a conversation. Her excitable nature makes her rather hyperactive, and even hasty. She has a rather peculiar imagination and asks Ren if he can imitate a sloth so that they can find each other in the Emerald Forest during the Beacon Academy Initiation. When Ren pointed out that sloths probably didn't make a lot of noise, Nora was quick to point that out as the strength of her plan, since no one would suspect them of working together. Even in combat, Nora retains her joyful personality, but she is seen to stay focused when actually fighting. This is shown in Episode 8, when she and Team JNPR battled a Death Stalker, during which she fought while grinning and laughing, only dropping her smile twice; once when their path was cut off by the Nevermore, then later when Ren was thrown into a stone pillar by the Death Stalker. Despite her generally cute personality, Nora does seem to have a love of battle. She may be a little psychotic when it comes to dealing with issues, as her solution to help Jaune with Cardin's bullying was to suggest breaking Cardin's legs. This is also evident in Episode 8 when she quickly reacts to Jaune's desire to help with the Death Stalker by launching him across the gap in the bridge with little or no concern for Jaune's safety or objections. She also appears to enjoy telling stories. In Episode 11 she is seen entertaining Team RWBY and JNPR by telling them about a recurring dream she has been having. It should be noted that she seems to exaggerate in order to make her stories more interesting, as Lie Ren somehow seemed to know what actually occurred in her dream and corrected her whenever she began to stretch the truth. Her free-spirited attitude is occasionally a nuisance to other members of the team, as shown when she eats the red sap Ren and Pyrrha had already finished collecting and later eats the syrup the team was going to have on their pancakes. Nora also seems to be very lazy when comes to her studies, such as dozing of in the library. Abilities and Powers Nora wields a dual-function weapon named Magnhild. Magnhild can transform into one of two weapons, a grenade launcher and a war hammer, which Nora uses proficiently in combat. She uses the grenade launcher form for ranged strikes on her opponent. When using the hammer form, she is a lot more versatile in close range attacks and movement. Nora uses the recoil of the grenade explosions fired from the face of the hammer to propel her certain distances or to add force to her strikes. In Players and Pieces she used the recoil of her hammer to launch herself from one end of a broken bridge to the other. Her ability to easily carry and use Magnhild in its hammer form suggests that she possesses a high level of strength. Her ability to send Weiss flying across the canteen during their food fight, despite not using Magnhild, demonstrates this. She also showed her strength when she sent Yang flying away through the roof in one hit, with the latter only landing back in the room nearly two minutes later. She may also possess some form of enhanced speed, as seen where she appeared from one place to another. Trivia *"Nora" may be an abbreviation of the Greek Eleanor or Eleonora, meaning light, or the Latin Honora, meaning honor. Nora, alternatively spelled Nóra or Norah, is also a given name in several European languages. In Arabic, "Nora" is another form of Noor or Nur (نور), also literally meaning 'light'. **Nora's name may reference her color via the Nora Barlow Columbine, a pink flower named after the granddaughter of Charles Darwin. *Her last name comes from the Valkyries of Norse mythology, female warrior servants of the gods in Valhalla. This could also indicate that her name is derived from the word "Norse". *It is also speculated that Nora is based on the Norse god of thunder, Thor. Monty stated that "All of team JNPR disguised themself in the other gender in their inspired character."Monty Oum's Twitter This aligns with the story of Thor, who is said to have disguised himself as the goddess Freyja in order to infiltrate the giant Þrymr's fortress. **Lending further credence to this allusion, Nora's symbol is likely a depiction of Mjölnir, the legendary hammer of Thor. Furthermore, Nora's weapon, Magnhild, is a large hammer, whose name is also derived from Old Norse. *The idea for Nora's weapon also stems from a video of a Mexican tradition where explosives are hit with sledgehammers.[http://youtu.be/dd6VbiD2iyk?t=1h9m45s Roooster Teeth Podcast #235] *Just as Ruby and Roman have personal belongings adorned with her symbol, Nora has her hairbrush stamped with her own symbol. *Nora seems to have a liking for sweet things, as she ate the red sap that Ren and Pyrrha had collected, as well as all of the syrup that Team JNPR was going to have on their pancakes. *Nora has the shortest height showing that she's even shorter than Ruby if their models are compared. References Category:Characters Category:Main Characters Category:Female Characters Category:Beacon Academy Students Category:Team JNPR Category:Protagonists Category:Human